Crisanta lowered her arms slowly, maintaining her smile as best she could while the sweat seemed to pour down her face.
“Very nice,” the coach told her, glancing up from her clipboard for what Crisanta was sure was just a little longer than she’d looked at all of the other girls. “We’ll let you know.”
Crisanta nodded politely, then jogged over to the bleachers, collapsing down next to Dorothy and Susie while the next hopeful quickly took her place. “Does she look more cheerful than me?” Crisanta asked quietly. “I think she looks more cheerful.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Dorothy assured her. “I saw her practicing yesterday; she’s not very good.”
“But the point of being a cheerleader is to be cheerful. Ow!” She glared at Susie, then turned bright red when she noticed the judge, and the girl who was about to begin her routine, were staring at her. “Sorry,” she squeaked, giving Susie a nasty look.
“You told me to pinch you if you started chewing on your lip,” Susie shrugged sheepishly.
“I didn’t mean for you to do it that hard,” Crisanta grumbled, just managing to stop herself before Susie could reach out for her arm again. She pulled the scrunchie out of her hair and stuffed it into the pocket of her shorts, which had the word Angel written across the bottom, shaking out her long, golden hair as she allowed herself to melt further back into the bleachers.
“If you’re this tired from a try-out, I don’t know how well you’re gonna do if you actually make the squad,” Dorothy whispered, pessimistic as usual.
“It’s just nerves,” Crisanta told her. “Plus, I practiced it, like, a million times. Give me a break.”
“This girl really -isn’t- very good,” Susie observed. “You were definitely better than her, anyway.”
“She does have two advantages over you, though,” Dorothy pointed out.
“But Crissy would be a lot easier for them to throw around,” Susie said somberly. “I guess it would come down to if…”
“If you’re going to talk about me like I’m not here, do it somewhere I’m not,” Crisanta growled.
“Shall we?” Dorothy teased, holding out her hand to Susie, until Crisanta knocked it aside.
“Wait until the try-outs are done, anyway,” she instructed, fighting back a yawn.
Crisanta closed her emerald green eyes, giving in to her exhaustion as well as she could in the uncomfortable seats.
The girl cringed as the hinges on her door creaked open, her bottom lip moving slowly towards her teeth as she peeked her head out into the hall, checking to see if there was light coming from under any of the other doors. There was, just a tad, from the night-light in her little sister, Camelia’s, room, but other than that, nothing.
She ducked back into her room, putting on her shoes and tying them tightly before grabbing the garbage bag. She checked the hallway one more time, to make sure nobody had woken at the sound of her door opening and sleepily flipped on their lights, then stepped out. She knew better than to try to tiptoe in those shoes, so she had to take her steps slowly, gingerly moving ever so slowly towards the front door.
She was about halfway there when she realized that she should have shut her bedroom door behind her – if anyone happened to glance into her room, it would be obvious she wasn’t there, and if they stuck their heads just a little further in, they’d be able to notice the lack of light coming from under the door of her private bathroom. Her sisters wouldn’t care enough to do anything, most likely, though they might ask her about it the next day, if they remembered. Her parents, on the other hand, might decide to investigate.
